Monday, December 12, 2011

A 60-year-old worker doing the decontamination experiment in Shimo-Oguni District of Date City, Fukushima Prefecture was found dead by his co-workers inside the company car at 1:00PM on December 12. An ambulance was called, but he was confirmed dead at 2PM.

The decon work was the first in Shimo-Oguni District in Date City that was planned by the Cabinet Office and was being carried out by the Japan Atomic Energy Agency. The government spokesman didn't know the details of the worker, or the details of the decon work being done, or how long the worker had worked before he was found dead. Citizen volunteers were not involved in this decon project, as far as the spokesman knew.

No information about where the worker was from, or whether he had a pre-existing condition. The spokesman did say the government knows the cause of the death, but is talking to the family of the deceased as to whether it is appropriate to disclose the cause.

The spokesman was extremely uncomfortable when he tried to answer the question of the cause of the death. He managed to say the death was not during the decon work.

=====================================The information was apparently disclosed by none other than Yasuhiro Sonoda, Cabinet Office official who drank Fuku-I water.

If a person died suddenly as he/she was doing the decontamination work in the area that produced rice with cesium far exceeding the national provisional safety limit, it has to be either the psychological stress in general and/or the pre-existing illness. Right? Right.

How many dozens of people have already died at Fukushima? A lot of workers are unemployed folk rounded up from all over Japan with no family. They can be cremated and disappear like magic.I get a kick out of, "The fact that he died on site is a proof that the death wasn't radiation related." Check out Chernobyl, Chucky!

Acute radiation sickness incapacitates. We are not dealing with that here. The dangers to the public and decon workers is different. Cesium accumulation in the heart muscle causes sudden cardiac problems, for example... and there are other ways to die suddenly after exposure (especially internal contamination) . That said, I also want to make a second point: suicides ARE victims. If this man DID kill himself he is no less of a victim of this nuclear crime. Ask yourself what you might do if your home, your family, your favorite places, your food and water, etc were deserted poisoned wastelands. Imagine the authorities keeping babies and children in areas just as poisoned as the evacuated ghost towns. Imagine that you are trying to cope with this new "life" and you are feeling fatigue, fighting colds, diarhea, nosebleeds and bruising that nevergo away. What might you do. I hope none of us are faced with that horror... but I also feel it is just a matter of time.

The spokesman's uncomfortability tells much. We can safely assume that the death circumstances aren't favorable for Tepco/the govt.

Maybe he left a goodbye letter, explaining much?

In any way, we can expect that they'll try to bribe the family to keep the thing secret.If the family is in financial problems, as to be expected with displaced people, the chances are good that they'll stay quiet in turn for some pecuniary compensation.

This way Tepco coerces even their victims who have lost their income due to Fuku I and have no other choice than to clean up for a living the mess Tepco did.

I still regularly see comments in English-language publications to the effect that no one has died or been injured as a result of the Fukushima disaster. Of course, most injuries will appear over an extended period of years, and causation may be unclear. Still, casualties and sicknesses seem to be occurring now. Has anyone compiled a list of those who have died, reported cancers, and so on? It would be nice to be able to cite a real number.

Ex-skf must be the only place on the internet where people are cheering for a high death count. Pretty ghoulish if you ask me. There is so much radiation paranoia on this site that people are actually wishing for a high death count so that their paranoia is vindicated.

@anon at 1:53 --No one here is "cheering for a high death count," least of all me. I'm just asking if anyone has compiled a list of the casualty reports which keep coming up. I'd rather rely on real data than the blanket denials from TEPCO, the government, and nuclear industry shills. If people believe those cavalier denials and do not take sensible precautions to avoid exposure, *that* ultimately will lead to a higher death count.

By discounting all the data coming from Tepco, the government, and the nuclear industry, I'm not sure where you are going to find your "real data", unless you count Twitter and the blogosphere as being real data.

@2:16 why is it that anyone who disagrees with the groupthink here is automatically labeled as a shill for the nuclear industry? Never mind, no need to answer. I think I already know.

@anon 2:50If you'd been paying attention for the past nine months, you would realize that the information provided by TEPCO and the government has been admitted to be wrong, or demonstrated to be wrong, over and over and over again. TEPCO and the government have financial and political incentives to minimize the extent of the contamination and the risk, and have consistently done so, at the expense of the facts. We've seen the pattern repeated: general denial for months, then admission that earlier assurances were false, contamination is worse than reported, different parts of the plant failed, food already sold and consumed was adulterated, and on and on.

As for twitter and blog posts, it seems that non-Japanese speakers are forced to rely on reports from such sources, since the western media is largely ignoring these issues. Then again, if you'd bothered to look around this blog, you would realize that it consists largely of articles translated from the Japanese news media, from press conferences (includes those of TEPCO and government reps), reports from academics and institutions, and not just anonymous rumors as you seem to believe.

About my coverage of Japan Earthquake of March 11

I am Japanese, and I not only read Japanese news sources for information on earthquake and the Fukushima Nuke Plant but also watch press conferences via the Internet when I can and summarize my findings, adding my observations.

About This Site

Well, this was, until March 11, 2011. Now it is taken over by the events in Japan, first earthquake and tsunami but quickly by the nuke reactor accident. It continues to be a one-person (me) blog, and I haven't even managed to update the sidebars after 5 months... Thanks for coming, spread the word.------------------This is an aggregator site of blogs coming out of SKF (double-short financials ETF) message board at Yahoo.

Along with commentary on day's financial news, it also provides links to the sites with financial and economic news, market data, stock technical analysis, and other relevant information that could potentially affect the financial markets and beyond.

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